McCann Erickson, the advertising arm of McCann Worldgroup, made an impressive medal haul during the recent Unilab Rave Awards. The top pharmaceutical company, and one of McCann’s biggest clients, holds the annual recognition of work and accomplishments of their club agencies. McCann Erickson’s campaign for Skelan’s “Ayos na ang Buto-Buto” was most awarded, with several citations including Best Campaign for the Medium Budget category.

An agency is better chosen by the quality of its people and what the agency has done for others—in other words, by standards similar to those the company uses in hiring executives. These include the abilities and personalities of the people working on the account and of the agency’s principals, the nature of the agency’s clients and what the agency’s clients and others say about its work.

But the agency must have the appropriate expertise and character. It was intimated to Bubuwit that unknown to this agency’s owners, this person who’s handling all the internal media placements of the company’s empire, has been “harassing” advertising executives for extra favours in placement of ads. The poor AE thinks this agency person is the backdoor to get ad placements so much so that this AE has to bring “special offerings” for the person-in-charge every time he/she visits the office. Otherwise the AE fears the risk of losing an account. Making the media officer happy may be a great idea, but those so-called  “extra efforts” has become an obligatory, a must before entering the agency’s office.

No matter how patrons of other advertising media wished otherwise, the fact remains: television is often referred as “the undisputed heavyweight champion of advertising.” It has certainly already entrenched itself quite firmly in the consciousness of the present.  It sounds relatively simple, and it is. That’s why one topnotch advertising guru urges all his clients to give serious consideration to television. Invariably—they become addicts—not addicted to watching TV, but to advertising on it. “Some 70 percent of our clientele’s budget still goes to TV,” observes one chief of a top multinational agency. “TV is the picture; it tells the story, it moves, it has texture. It’s definitely more exciting.”

In spite of many stories with happy endings, TV is incredibly easy to abuse, and is horribly misused by some advertisers who use it. Some of their commercials are so ridiculously bad that they lose customers every time they run. This is true for the smallest business in town, as well as for many of the blue-chip companies. Still, most folks think they’re in showbiz when they run a spot on TV.

Marketers know they’re in sellbiz. Even though the components of good TV ads are really no more than common sense—as is much of advertising—bad TV commercials are as omnipresent as sand on the beach. So here, in front of my computer, I plead with you not to waste money on TV advertising in ways that defy imagination. Others will do it all around you. Good advice is hard to find, good examples even harder. A minefield is a grassy meadow compared with the terrain of TV. Yet TV is the king of advertising hill, and when used with the genius of the marketer, it can be devastating—to your competition.

The secret to TV is no secret at all. It begins with a strong idea, evolves to a visual expression of that idea, combines with a compelling opening line or sound, then becomes further empowered with copy and demonstration. Finally, it ends with a call to action—telling viewers exactly what they are supposed to do now, verbally and visually.